George Jonas: The evolution of Canadian intolerance

Ukraine has started boiling over, the Middle East continues to do so, and how are things in Canada? Splendid, thanks, compared to the rest of the world. Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau are currently engaged in a contest of tossing senators under a bus, with Harper doing so conservatively, two or three at a time, but Trudeau tossing his senators liberally, in batches of 32. Some people like the sport and applaud. In another age they might have gone for dwarf-tossing.

Talking of mental midgetry, I read in the paper that Carsten Jensen, president of the Law Society of Alberta, is being taken to task by Alberta lawyer and public policy maven John Carpay for trying to prevent Trinity Western University from starting a law school.

My first reaction is a double take. Is a law society president trying to prevent a university from starting a law school? It must be a misprint — but no. There in the pages of the Calgary Herald is Carpay’s column: “[T]he president of the Law Society of Alberta wrote to Alberta lawyers to express his opposition to the new law school at Trinity Western University, an evangelical Christian university in Langley, B.C.”

Ah! An evangelical Christian university, eh? That may explain it. “Evangelical Christian” means these folks are religious, doesn’t it, and religious people may take unacceptable positions in the culture wars. Some of the faithful are downright incorrect politically. Believers may give precedence to values other than the unbridled procreative freedom of women, for instance — a heresy in the theology of left liberalism.

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Indeed, Carpay writes that “Jensen disagrees with Trinity’s code of student conduct, called the ‘community covenant’, which students voluntarily agree to adhere to when choosing to attend the university.” Well, I may not blame Jensen for disagreeing; I may not subscribe to such a code myself, or not all of it, anyway, except I rarely see a need for shutting down things to which I don’t subscribe. This is what makes me an old-fashioned liberal. Modern liberals either subscribe to something or throw it under the bus.

As Carpay tells it: “The Federation of Law Societies of Canada recently approved the Trinity law school program, but Carsten Jensen wants to see a court strike down this decision.” Why? Well, it seems that “the community covenant prohibits drunkenness, witchcraft, gossip, pornography, all forms of sex outside of marriage, and a long list of other behaviours and practices.”

“Jensen is deeply troubled by the fact that Trinity, as an evangelical Christian university, believes that sexual intimacy is ‘reserved for marriage between one man and one woman,’” Carpay writes. Frankly, what troubles me is how far our culture has moved in how short a time without having moved at all.

When I landed in Canada in the mid-1950s a university didn’t have to be evangelical or even Christian for such a code. A secular or avowedly atheistic university would have had similar rules. Far from being potential arguments against accreditation, an institution couldn’t have hoped to be accredited without some such covenant, implied or expressed.

Fifty years ago it was obligatory to prohibit what is now obligatory to permit or even promote

Did such codes govern behavior? Yes and no. Most people gossiped despite covenants; many had too much to drink occasionally, or engaged in pre- or extra-marital sex. People breached not only codes of conduct but the law when they procured abortions or engaged in certain homosexual acts. The point is something else. It’s that 50 years ago it was obligatory to prohibit what is now obligatory to permit or even promote. You have come a long way, baby, without having gone anywhere; the one thing you haven’t learned is how to leave well enough alone.

I saw nothing wrong with homosexuality 50 years ago but saying so in print could have cost me my job. Today, if I did see something wrong with it, saying so in print wouldn’t be a wise career move. When the political scientist Tom Flannigan said something insufficiently condemnatory about child pornographers last year it cost him a CBC contract. We’re no more tolerant than we were 50 years ago; we’ve just reversed what we’re intolerant about.

Religion enjoys Charter protection in Canada, of course, and with Charter protection and five bucks you can buy a cup of coffee. In any contest between the Charter and the zeitgeist, the smart money is on the zeitgeist even if the Charter is sturdy, and Canada’s is still recovering from chickenpox.

On the brighter side, an idea did occur to me about how to make the world a safer place while listening to Canada’s Prime Minister address the Israeli Knesset the other day. It was a pretty good speech and it would have been perfect if Barack Obama had delivered it. Couldn’t we have them switch jobs for the duration? We have pretty much everything Obama wants already on the books. He can’t do us much harm. Harper, on the other hand, may do America and the world some good.

In the wake of a Grammy Awards ceremony that disappointed many, from Kanye West to the masses on Twitter lamenting the state of pop music, a historical perspective is key. Few are better poised to offer one than Andy Kim.